Nigeria’s men’s national team, D’Tigers’ former coach and current handler of New York Knicks in USA, Mike Brown has faulted the exclusion of Ogugua ‘OG’ Anunoby from the National Basketball Association (NBA) all-stars’ defensive list.
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Sports247 reports that, while Anunoby’s name was in the initial short-list for the roll call of honours, the Nigerian-born Great Britain international did not make the last-five cut, much to the chagrin of Brown, who tagged it an error by NBA buffs.
The Knicks’ gaffer used the opportunity of a post-match press briefing after his team’s 121-108 win in Game 3 of the 2026 Eastern Conference finals to address the issue publicly, in order to get it off his chest.
When the NBA announced the league’s 2025-26 All-Defensive Teams on Friday, Anunoby was one of the 10 players selected for recognition, but he was not named among the top five selected through votes by a panel of 100 media members across the globe.
The panel instead relegated him to defensive B-team for the second time in his career, having also earned the same spot in 2022-23, while playing for Toronto Raptors, but his coach is not accepting the ‘demotion’ lightly this time around.
Incidentally, Anunoby is joined on the second team’s list by Raptors’ forward Scottie Barnes, Thunder guard Cason Wallace, Atlanta Hawks guard Dyson Daniels and Miami Heat’s Nigerian-born centre, Bam Adebayo.
Brown admitted that many good players were selected to the defensive all-stars A-list, and he stopped short of criticising their presence, but averred that Anunoby should have been among them.
He told the media, “I got one more thing before I’m taking off. You guys can all print this. Great players out there. I’m not discounting anybody. But OG got robbed. He should’ve been First Team All-Defense. First Team All-Defense.”
Dramatically, the gaffer’s verdict followed hot on the heels of a view raised by another in-form player, Karl-Anthony Towns, who took reporters and award-voting panel to task at the end of his shared post-game news conference with Anunoby.
Karl-Anthony did not let the press conference end without mentioning his awe for Anunoby and wondered about him being placed in the second-team all-defense list, adding “He’s one of the best defenders in the world and he got robbed from first!”
However, NBA insiders pointed out that, while players get two award points per first team vote, and one point per second team vote, Anunoby received 11 first team nods, 45 second team votes to end up in ninth position overall.
The assessors also noted that, while Anunoby got a total of 67 total points, Barnes, Wallace and Adebayo all got closer to a First Team berth than the 28-year-old forward, who finished the NBA’s regular season tied for sixth in steals per game.
He also tied for 43rd in deflections per game, with 48 blocked shots in 67 games and opponents shot 2.7 percentage points worse than expected field-goal percentage when Anunoby was their defender, according to NBA Advanced Stats.
Anunoby, though, opted to stay calm and simply accepted his placement in the consolation list, as he retorted, “It was cool to get the recognition. I feel like I’ve been a great defender for years.
“Anytime you get recognition – recognized by coaches or the media, your peers, whatever – it’s really cool. Second Team is cool. I was hoping I got First Team. I thought I should have got First Team; but Second Team. It’s good. Just as good.”
